White wine and lemon chicken

Ever struggle to answer the age old question "what's for dinner?" Boy I do. And the Hubbie is no help either. He'll tell you what he DOESN'T want but isn't much help for ideas. Since starting back to work, which means I have to be that much more efficient, I have started creating a list of dinner options. That way one of us can look at the list and pick an item and I know I have all the ingredients. Plus when I shop, I can usually make sure I get everything I need easily.

This week our menu looked like this:

• Vegetable Beef Stew with beer muffins
• Chicken Pot Pie (Daniel's favorite comfort food)
• Chicken Noodle Soup and grilled cheese sandwhiches (a favorite of Charlie's)
• Chicken Florentine ring
• Pork Tenderloin and veggies
• Spaghetti
• Shrimp Creole (a client brought it over and we froze some)
• Soup and Sandwiches (usually butternut squash soup and paninis)

One of the things I love to do when I have 5 minutes of down time is to watch the cooking channel. OK. I'll admit it. Since I became pregnant with Cole, I am addicted to it. My favorite shows are The Next Iron Chef America: Super Chefs, Cupcake Wars, Cook Like a Rock Star (I think that's what it is called with Chef Anne Burrell), Restaurant Impossible and Chef Hunter. The things the Iron Chefs can cook in those challenges is insane! And the cupcakes from Cupcake Wars!? I'd love to taste some of the dishes and cupcakes.  But I digress...

When I was sitting down to errr...express some nourishment for Cole (i.e. pump), I started watching the Barefoot Contessa. Or at least I think that's who it was. I don't usually watch TV during that hour so I could be wrong. Anywhoozle, she was putting together a quick dinner party menu. I had enough time to catch the main course - baked chicken with white wine sauce so I thought I'd give it a shot. Now you know in those shows they "sort've" show you how and "sort've" give you the ingredients so you "sort've" have to guesstimate sometimes.  

I have to say this dish was pretty tasty although I would tweak the recipe a bit to accomodate my taste buds. So the below recipe is Anna-vised. The Hubbie gave it two thumbs up so it's something I could fix again.  

Baked Chicken with White Wine and Lemon Sauce

Ingredients
2 chicken breasts (skin on, bone in)
1/2 cup white wine
1/4 cup lemon juice
1-2 shallots, finely chopped
1/4 cup half & half or heavy cream
1/2 stick butter, cubed
salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Salt and pepper both sides of chicken breasts. In a cast-iron skillet, add a few TBS of EVOO. Once oil is heated, add chicken breasts, skin side down. Cook on med-high heat for 5-7 minutes then turn and cook an additional 3 minutes. This will get the skin side nice and crispy before it goes in the oven.
2. Place chicken and skillet in 375 pre-heated oven (no need to cover) and cook for about 20-30 minutes or until juices are clear
3. For the sauce, add the shallotts, white wine and lemon juice to a pan and reduce on medium heat to about 2 TBS. In other words, cook it until there's only about 2 TBS left. If you over reduce it, just add a little more white wine to it.
4. Add the cream and then remove from heat.
5. Add the butter and melt then add salt and pepper to taste.
6. Remove chicken from skillet and spoon sauce over each breast.

Now depending on your tastes, you may want to add less lemon juice and more cream or vice versa. The sauce is a very lemony sauce so don't expect a creamy, mild taste. But once it's paired with the chicken, it's delicious! I served this with steamed broccoli (the sauce was really good on the broccoli too) and mashed potato casserole.

Hope you enjoy! (If you want any of the recipes listed in my menu, shoot me an email or post a comment and request it).

Bon Apetit!